Asian vultures survival chances increased by drugs ban.
01/03/2007 00:00:00
Asian vultures and diclofenac
- Meloxicam is a more recently developed drug that is used across Europe and the USA on livestock.
- Scientists have calculated that less than 1% of carcasses need to contain diclofenac to cause vulture populations to decline.
- Vultures have an important role in scavenging and clearing up carcasses in Asia. The lack of vultures in Asia has caused a huge increase in feral dog numbers. Packs of wild dogs feed on carcass dumps which increases the threat of rabies and other diseases. Water pollution may also be effected as feral dogs are less effective in cleaning carcasses.
- Vultures were common in Nepal and were abundant in rural areas. Now they are found only in isolated sites, in small numbers.
- The RSPB and the India-based Bombay Natural History Society have created vulture conservation and breeding centres in India. These centres will help ensure the survival of the endangered vultures by providing a safe haven for all 3 species. Captured adults and young birds that were bred at the centres will be released into the wild when southern Asia is clear of diclofenac. There are plans for a similar centre in Nepal.
- Research published in Nature in 2004, led by the US based Peregrine Fund in Pakistan discovered that diclofenac was poisonous to Gyps vultures and was widely used in South Asia. Scientists found that diclofenac residues were present in 75% of dead vultures recovered across the region. In 2006, researchers from Pretoria University and the RSPB established that diclofenac is likely to be toxic to all species of Gyps vulture.
- Establishing the safety of meloxicam has involved an international collaboration between veterinary scientists and conservationists, who have worked in Southern Africa and India. Partners in this work include the Indian Veterinary Research Institute, the Bombay Natural History Society, The Veterinary Faculty of the University of Pretoria (South Africa), the De Wildt Wildlife and Cheetah Trust (South Africa), the Rare and Endangered Species Trust (Namibia), the Zoological Society of London and the RSPB.
Hopes of saving Asian vultures have been boosted by a Nepalese drug company in Nepal. Following on from the Indian governments banning in May of diclofenac, the drug responsible for the 97% decline in numbers of 3 species of vulture across Asia, the drug will also be banned in Nepal.
Nepal’s biggest veterinary pharmaceutical company is now selling a replacement drug at the same price so Nepalese authorities can halt the domestic manufacture and importation of diclofenac. The vultures suffer and die from kidney failure and getting rid of diclofenac is the sole way of saving them. Diclofenac has been much cheaper than the new treatment, meloxicam.
Dr Richard Cuthbert, RSPB director, said: ‘This is excellent news and shows it is possible to produce meloxicam swiftly and competitively and at a price that farmers can afford. If the region’s other pharmaceutical firms follow suit, the vultures of Asia may yet be saved from extinction. Their decline has been faster than that of the dodo but there is now a chance of preventing them from suffering the same fate.’
Oriental white-backed vulture and the slender-billed vulture numbers have doved 90% in Nepal in the last decade and by 97% in India and Pakistan. India’s long-billed vulture has undergone a similar decline and ½ of all the remaining vultures are dying every year.
The production of Melox by Medivet in Nepal, and the Nepalese import and production ban, is a major step forward for conservation in Asia.
Bird Conservation Nepal, the Bombay Natural History Society, the RSPB and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) have all campaigned for the banning of diclofenac for some years and in January scientists proved that meloxicam was a safe alternative.
Dr Hem Sagar Baral of Bird Conservation Nepal stated: ‘It’s not too late for Nepal’s vultures. The prompt removal of diclofenac and the introduction of meloxicam, along with local conservation initiatives, can bring these essential birds back from the brink of extinction.’
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